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Morning Musings – Resolutions vs Projects

/ riainthecity / Leave a comment

books

You know how I made resolutions earlier this year and then kept up with very few of them, if at all?
Yup I’ll be the first to admit that I am not very good with keeping up with resolutions and they really don’t work for me. Instead, what works is coming up with projects and working on them and one of the projects I want to work on next year is borrowing more from the library instead of buying books – well at least for a month!

Books are the best investment but lately this is how I’ve been spending my money…

How I spend my money

To make sure that I am on the path to success, I am starting out my resolutions a little early and starting December I am no longer going to be buying books. Let’s see how long this lasts.

Have you already started working on your resolutions?

This site

/ riainthecity / 2 Comments

I started this site two years ago as a part of the Nanowrimo project. Over the last two years, we have gone through so much. Heartbreaks, love, school, breakups, make ups and everything in between. Also, blogging awards!

For some time I wanted to focus on my other site but I think I am going to come back to this and do what I liked doing best. Just writing. So here I am and I hope to reconnect with all of you again!

Love,

Ria

Hope

/ riainthecity / 2 Comments

She was afraid at first, for there was an all too familiar feeling; dread.

Yes, dread was it. She didn’t know what was happening but he was getting into her head and her heart and there was no denying or stopping it.

She tried to block him out at first.

Once, while holding her, he told her that at the start he was trying to push her away, intentionally. She wanted to laugh and say, ‘well that makes the two of us.’

He wasn’t the only one hiding secrets. War scars is what she called them. We all have them. For all of life is a certain type of war, is it not?

Some of us show our scars, while some of us try to conceal them and we get so good at hiding them that we even fool ourselves and doubt their existence.

Around him, she could not hide them anymore and it took every single particle of her being to stop herself from loving him. She was attracted to him like nail filings to a magnet and there came a point when she stopped fighting the feeling.

Around him, she could be herself. Around him, everything became easier.

She could just tell him her deepest, darkest secrets and not be afraid that he would tell anyone. Not be afraid that he would betray her, or so she hoped.

Hope; it keeps us going does it not?

hope

The things that I do.

/ riainthecity / 8 Comments

By this point in time, I’ve already written tried to type at least 5 posts. 

Oh hey there! Don’t mind me, I am fresh out of ideas! but as my best friend put it, ‘this is just a phase and it will pass’

Those of you who noticed, I have started another site called roastedkeyboard.com and if you subscribe, I’ll love you forever. No, seriously, I will, A TON! try clicking the Follow Button and see what happens! It is updated every Sunday. I mean it will be. I have only done one post so far! Oh and I also post stuff that I have written for other sites over there.

Also, set up a Facebook Page, there is a link to it on the right side of this page! I share links and photos and general random stuff there, if you are into that sort of thing.

So now that I have told you what I have been up to lately, can I wrap up this post with a song? I love you guys and I will be back with more content soon. Thank you for reading!

P.S: I will still update this blog with tidbits about my life. The new site is supposed to be sorta semi professional. Ah ok BYE! ❤

Of dumb things and people. Cryptic post is… cryptic.

/ riainthecity / 26 Comments

The title is uber clever right? -_-

So, I did something extremely dumb. I won’t say whether I did it yesterday or a couple of days ago because that’ll be like giving away too much information.

But, I think it’s safe to say that I’ve officially lost my appetite. (it’s got nothing to do with love, if that’s what you are thinking… aha! you were thinking that, weren’t you?)

The thing with stupid things is that once you start doing them, they just suck you in and you want to do more. One minute you’ll be like, ‘oh hey! I don’t want to do this because I am a rational and a logical human being right?’ right *insert an exasperated expression here* and the next thing you know, ‘BAM! STUPID STUPID STUPID’.

I want to tell myself, this too shall pass but my stomach is in knots. I feel sick. No, I didn’t kill or hurt anyone. Geez.

Does this happen to you? Do you feel this way sometimes?

oh hey, this time, next year… JAPAN! BAM!

There you go, just a little update.

P.S: This is exactly why I have come to fear socializing, makes sense?

I wish I had bothered instagramming that but oh hey… 😀 *what has been seen cannot be unseen* wheee!

Also, I need an undo button in my life. Do you?

What inspires you?

/ riainthecity / 20 Comments

I keep coming across blogs and books advertising that they will give you ideas for your blog and teach you how to come up with new ideas. BULLSH*T! I’ve read a few of such books, which I shall not mention here, but they have little or nothing to teach you.

For starters it’s your blog, you don’t need to read a book to get ideas. Just look around you and your life is filled with ideas. You just need to find a source of inspiration. However, if you really need ideas then just read the gazillions of blog articles available for free!

Another thing about these blogs is that they seem to harbor the notion that any successful blogger just needs to keep on creating. That’s so not true! Not creating is better than creating just for the sake of creating!

You must have something that you want to talk about, a point you want to get across or a message you want to deliver to your readers. Inspiration could come from anywhere; books, magazines, travel trips, daily life or even dreams.

Personally, my two favorite sources of inspirations are daily life and dreams. I love reading blogs and books that are true to normal life because that is something that you can relate to. Real life doesn’t have to be dull and drab, there are plenty of interesting things that happen in everyone’s life, you just have to take the time to notice them.

Dreams inspire me because my dreams are my goals. They give me an indication of what i want to achieve in real life. This may sound ridiculous but I keep a notebook under my pillow so that if I wake up in the middle of the night I could just scribble my idea in it. Seems to work just fine for me. Bet no book gave you that idea, did they? 😉

Happy blogging and writing, remember to Keep It Real! Don’t Just create for the sake of creating.

So, what inspires you?

My two cents worth on gaining a readership in the blogosphere

/ riainthecity / 11 Comments

Ever since I started blogging in 2004 I have read numerous blogs and here is what I think about the topic of gaining a readership for your blog.

[Assumption: Your content is relevant and interesting ;)]

Keep it short

Long winded blog entries bore people. So, unless you can keep the interest up, try to keep your posts short and sweet.

This doesn’t apply to all genres. If you run a political blog then long blogs are more helpful.

Illustrate/ Use pictures

A picture really does speak a thousand words and if the pictures you use interest people, they are more likely to carry on reading your blog.

Use a visible background

We get it black is a cool color but more often than not dark backgrounds cause eye strain. So use a lighter background. A light background is soothing to the eyes and makes things more visible.

This is what i feel like everytime i visit a blog with a dark background.

Keep it neat and tidy 

By tidy I don’t mean you can’t use ad sense. By all means advertise but keep it categorized. Don’t use too many tabs or an ‘ all over the place’  kind of design. Background pictures are nice but don’t let them overwhelm your content. There are blogs that I frequent which have amazing content but have fewer followers than they deserve and I can’t help but think this is due to the layout they have used.

If you want people to visit your blog…

…then visit theirs and leave comments, like posts or follow their blog. It’s a basic reciprocity principle.

Use a funky gravatar

I have noticed that people with funky gravatars are more likely to have their profiles clicked on than people using more mundane ones.

Use catchy headlines not misleading ones

I titled a post ‘Justin Bieber is the father of Mariah Yeater’s child‘ and within half an hour of posting it on twitter i received hundreds of visits. However this was just done as a little marketing experiment and you should refrain from doing this because it’s funny once but do it twice and you will thoroughly piss people off.

Keep it simple

Remember you are writing for human beings not dictionaries and while it’s great to read blogs with good vocabulary, cut down on the usage of bombastic words.

Keep it relevant

I would like to hear your opinion about this too! So leave me a comment letting me know 🙂 Have an awesome weekend!